Month: April 2014

This post has been on my mind for a long time. A really, really long time. I moved to San Francisco in February of 2007. With that rusty old Jeep Cherokee packed with all my worldly possessions, I can vividly remember charging over the bay bridge on a sunny winter’s morning. With equal parts enthusiasm and anxiety, I sprinted towards my new life. I had no job, had just returned from the Peace Corps, wasn’t totally sure what I was doing with my career, and on top of all that was moving to a real city for the first time. I never could have imagined how my life would unfold so many years into the future. Diana. Pixar. Software engineering. New friends. Old friends. New family. Old family. The amount of life that has filled my cup since I came to the city by the bay – whew – it’s amazing when I try and fathom how much has happened from 25 to 32.

And now, nearly seven years to the day after that memorable trip over the bridge, your blogger found himself again in a packed car, traveling to a new life. But this time it was a bit different. Sure, the change was huge. Sure, I was anxious. But this time I was moving to a new place with a partner – My great Love, my fellow blogger.

And now, a few months later, I find myself sitting on my couch, finally getting around to punching out my thoughts on this keyboard, and full of a contentment I didn’t think was possible. Moving in with Di has been one of the greatest joys of my life. And Oakland. I hella love it here.

It has been months since I rocked a post, so there are a million things to write about. But, I’ve opened a nice bottle of wine (thanks Danch!), built a fire in the fireplace (thanks Dad!), turned on some Pandora through the new sound system (thanks Aki!), and am ready to let this flow.

This is gonna be part chronological, part whatever. We’ve got weddings, triathlons, birthdays, bike trips, and a few other assorted excursions on the agenda for this evening’s post.

Two of the most kind, generous, and downright good looking people we know. It was fitting that on my last night in SF, I spent it celebrating their wedding. Jesse has been a mentor and a friend to me since my first few weeks in the city. I remember so well that day he stayed late at work to teach me how to load a .dat file into a Concordance database. Jesse took me under his wing, and gave me a priceless education. There are very, very few people to whom I am more professionally indebted. Jesse – you are the man.

I was so nuked. And he asked me about the race. Andy Potts! Friggin world champ! I wish I could have mustered a better, more inspired answer. But all I could do was grumble. And the man – like a total champ would – responded with a pep talk I will never forget. We do this for the exact feeling I had at that finish line. It’s hard. That’s why we are there.

So here I am going through this cache of old pics, and I literally just hit a vein of pure gold. It was mid winter, the team was Corrigan, Seider, Rocci, and me. The mission was Samuel P. Taylor. The transportation was bikes!

And then the backlog of all this stuff just piled up and I couldn’t motivate myself to write.

But this post – this post has been cathartic. It feels so good to share my pictures and my loved ones and my joy with you all. Life has been good, and I am indebted to so many excellent souls out there who have made these days so golden.